Won't you take some of it for a gownd ?' 'No,' says she, 'I'm set up for cotton gownds.' 'Why not buy a bit of it for a apron or two ?' I said.
'Nothing's cleaner than them lavender prints for morning aprons, and they saves the white.' So she looked at it for a minute, and then she said I might cut her off a couple o' yards of the light, and send it up with the other things.

Well, sir, Sally Green went away with her buttons, and I took down the light print, thinking I'd cut off the two yards at once.

Just then, Susan Peckaby comes in for some gray worsted, and she falls right in love with the print.

'I'll have a gownd of that,' says she, 'and I'll take it now.' In course, sir, I was only too glad to sell it to her, for, like Rachel, she's good pay; but when I come to measure it, there was barely nine yards left, which is what Susan Peckaby takes for a gownd, being as tall as a maypole.

So I was in a mess; for I couldn't take and sell it all, over Rachel's head, having offered it to her.